“I do want to give a shout out to SpaceX,” Clapper said May 22, offering his support for the competition the upstart company is offering to entrenched government launch services provider United Launch Alliance of Denver — which only hours before Clapper spoke launched a classified National Reconnaissance Office satellite out of Florida aboard an Atlas 5 rocket.

“The way to drive down cost, typically, is through competition,” Clapper said, noting that “launch costs are a huge part of my budget.”